Gene Stout was the pop music critic for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer for more than two decades. His work continues at GeneStout.com, an independent online source for news, previews, reviews, feature stories and silly rumors about local and national music. Occasionally, Gene draws outside the lines of popular music to write about food, wine and lifestyle.

Performing songs from his hot-selling fourth studio album, “Loverboy,” singer-songwriter Brett Dennen kicked off the West Coast leg of his current tour with a show June 14 at the Moore Theatre.
Seattle photographer Jim Bennett was at the show to capture a few images of Dennen and opening act Dawes, a country-tinged L.A. group led by [...]
[Read More]

By GENE STOUT It isn’t hard to imagine U2 as the first band to play outer space. Not after seeing the Irish supergroup’s rocket-powered concert Saturday night, June 4, at Seattle’s Qwest Field. They’ve conquered the world, so why not the moon and stars? They’ve certainly earned enough money from the 360 Degree Tour – […]
[Read More]

By GENE STOUT
It isn’t hard to imagine U2 as the first band to play outer space.
Not after seeing the Irish supergroup’s rocket-powered concert Saturday night, June 4, at Seattle’s Qwest Field. They’ve conquered the world, so why not the moon and stars? They’ve certainly earned enough money from the 360 Degree Tour – the highest-grossing [...]
[Read More]

When U2 played the old Kingdome in 1997, lead singer Bono expressed doubts that the band would ever be able to launch another stadium tour because of the expense and logistics. But U2 is now the top dog of touring bands, breaking records each year. The 360 Degree Tour is now the highest-grossing tour in history, blowing past the Rolling Stones’ Bigger Bang trek.
[Read More]

By GENE STOUT
Even without the crazy news that Osama bin Laden had been killed by U.S. forces, the crowd at Chris Cornell’s hometown solo acoustic show Sunday night at the Moore Theatre was thoroughly pumped up, if not a bit crazed. And a few were well-lubricated for the occasion.
Cornell, flanked by an array of guitars [...]
[Read More]

By GENE STOUT
Seattle singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile, whose voice is among the most powerful and stirring in the Northwest, calls her new CD “a rock ‘n’ roll symphony album.”
“It really is the meeting of two worlds, two different kinds of artists who got together for completely different reasons,” Carlile says.
“Brandi Carlile — Live at Benaroya Hall [...]
[Read More]

Rod Stewart may not be “Forever Young,” as one of his more famous songs suggests, but he could have fooled me.
At 66, the veteran rocker appeared trim, handsome and athletic Saturday night at KeyArena, kicking soccer balls into the crowd with the precision of a seasoned player and gliding effortlessly across a sprawling stage that [...]
[Read More]

By JO ANN RIGGS
It was a true Kodachrome moment.
Paul Simon, who’d played WaMu Theater in Seattle on April 15, debuted the club portion of his new U.S. tour here Sunday night, April 17, at the Showbox at the Market.
This was in many ways a snapshot of an earlier time, when the not-yet-headinin’ Simon haunted the [...]
[Read More]

New York disco-pop revivalists Holy Ghost! made a stop at Showbox SoDo Tuesday, April 12, the very day their self-titled debut album hit stores.
Sharing the stage was Cut Copy, a synth-pop band from Melbourne, Australia.
The new album “Holy Ghost!” includes 10 infectious, driving songs, featuring guest performances by Luke Jenner (The Rapture), Penguin Prison and [...]
[Read More]

By MIKEL TOOMBS
As he has since at least 1956, when Simon and Garfunkel first became a duo, Paul Simon ponders the mysteries of the music that enthralls him: “Lord, is it Be Bop a Lula,” he asks at one point on his new album, “or ooh Papa Doo?”
In fact, the wonderful “So Beautiful or So [...]
[Read More]